The Trump administration is preparing an executive order that would halt federal funding, at least temporarily, for a risky and controversial kind of research into viruses that makes the pathogens more dangerous or contagious.
The goal of the order would be to stop scientists with U.S. funding from conducting “gain-of-function” research on viruses that could endanger human health, people familiar with the plans said, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Details haven’t been finalized.
Gain-of-function, funded by the US, is likely responsible for the Wuhan Virus, aka China Virus.
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the nominee to lead the National Institutes of Health, backs the halt.
Other countries will continue the research. That fact is used to keep the funding for the research going and increasing.
A U.S. intelligence report released in 2021 said that the virus causing Covid-19 was likely the result of an accident if it leaked from a lab rather than the product of deliberate genetic engineering.
There is no evidence COVID formed in nature.
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